a blog that reminds you: just stay calm. no need to sparkle.

Month: August 2009

This weekend was camping with Oriana, her beau and K — scheduled, but planned as much as you plan a peanut-butter sandwich. In a good way.

Lessons:

-Campfires need dry wood, medium-sized sticks, and lighter fluid. You can ask your techno-blasting neighbors for lighter fluid.
-Got coffee cups? You got wine cups.
-Waking up to the lake and a morning fire is the world’s most relaxing prescription.
-The hot dog buns were probably not kidnapped. But the techno-neighbors are suspects.
-Who needs to pack clothes when you can just wear the same thing twice: encore outfit!
-Camping is a legitimate excuse to eat Hershey bars for breakfast. Graham crackers and marshmallows optional.

I’m envisioning a black-and-white movie where the female lead keeps switching hats and pretending to be other people. She slinks into the dinner party in her wide-brimmed feathery hat… (gathers intel, samples a deviled egg); she slips on a jaunty satin cap and collects secrets at a speakeasy… (tiny notebook, tiny pencil, swig of gin). Everyone is fooled.

I’m not sure if this movie exists. Maybe it’s actually just my brain’s visualization of the phrase “wearing many hats”. Either way. When I think about my mental state, I think of this idea. Lots of people with all their different needs; I’m fitting in, blending into the wallpaper — and maybe the subterfuge isn’t against the Russians, it’s against my sanity.

On a Friday morning the best I can do is take a deep breath and feel the tightness where my lungs forgot how to breathe and wait for them to open; watch how a hot cup of coffee makes curls of steam, better than a three-D, live-action Van Goh; crack the crick out of my spine and listen to the traffic whir on the pavement; pull back a thin white cotton curtain — outside is damp from a misty rain; forget that my hair will be all crazy today because hello, humidity; listen to the ceiling fan click click click where the pull-string thwacks the light fixture; wonder if this is a sneeze, wonder if this is a sneeze; no sneeze; ponder last night’s smudgy wine glass still on the coffee table — and start this day.

I’m not the world’s most flexible gal. This is nothing new. The “sit and reach”portion of the President’s Fitness Challenge in school was always a sad joke. And in yoga class I’m usually apologizing to the instructor after like 15 minutes. Luckily in yoga they’re like, “Whatever you are, it’s perfect.” Whee!

But I recently took a fitness test as part of my new (already under-used) gym membership. In most areas, even though I could only squeak out a few push-ups, the trainer remained objective. But she truly went eye-poppingly amazed when I couldn’t touch my toes. Like, not at all. Like, my fingertips and toes were like feet apart. Really? No, just reach a little harder there… Seriously? That’s all you can do? Yes, lady, shuddup.

So I’ve been practicing a little each morning, thirty seconds at a time, and today the very tips of my fingers curled over the very bottoms of my toes. It felt unnatural. Like waving a third arm out of my spine. The bottoms of my toes were rougher than I remembered. (I guess I don’t spend a lot of time on my feet…) But in the tiny universe of stretch, reach, stretch: a victory.

I think Jeff Goldblum was picking two-by-fours out of the dumpster behind the dry cleaners on my way to work.

I think this sunshine is giving me immortality. Unless coffee will be the death of me, a caffeinated jitterbug death dance because I had more than half a cup.

Shiow brought me two soft juicy peaches yesterday, that her friend gave her, from a farm, and today I gave one to Oriana, and this is what friends do.

Julie & Julia is a good movie, better because I saw it with Eliina, Tara and Amanda. Milk Duds and wine. We’re all grown up.

ADHD is not just mental, it’s an organism, a living thing, there’s an ADHD caterpillar that bores into the base of my skull and makes small tasks vibrate and pulse with nuclear horror and someone give me a hazmat suit and then I’ll start this project.

Whenever I’m visiting Buffalo, I try to meet up with Deanna and Janelle. We catch up via long conversations that wind and loop through the past months. Often this means curling up on the corner cushion of Janelle’s family room couch, or crunching through fall leaves on a long walk in Clarence Center with Deanna. Every time, I learn something new about myself, and them, and the way we’re growing up.

Usually I see them each individually, but this time we decided to gather as a trio. Later, when my mom asked me what we did, I said we spent the day talking — which was true. But that doesn’t really capture the beauty of a day to connect, the deep relaxation and 8-hour vacation from everyday life.